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evidence Barrett had hacked his way in, though she saw several new attempts that morning. Annie puzzled over what else she could do to ensure he would never succeed and clicked her way around the keys for another half hour. Then she stretched out on the bed and turned on the television to pass the time until computer and phone were fully powered. Idly, she searched “Amish in Colorado” and read several newspaper reports of the group’s migration west. Every few minutes she glanced at the charging icons to monitor progress.
    When she slammed Rick’s head with the duffel back in the aspen grove, Annie surrendered personal items that would have kept her going for a few days. At minimum, she was going to need a fresh shirt and perhaps a baggy T-shirt to sleep in. Annie pulled up Google Maps and looked at the route between the motel and Westcliffe shops.
    The walk to Westcliffe’s quaint Main Street was an easy mile with the placid mystery of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains unfolding in constant view. Annie followed the gray highway across ground growth rolling in yellowish stripes before giving way to an irrigated green that signaled a town. A hazy memory niggled at her of a family trip to the Great Sand Dunes when she was small. Her intuition told her she was not far from where she played in a flowing creek with her sister while her mother sat in an orange lawn chair with her feet in the water on a beastly hot day. Other than that, Annie could not recollect being in this part of the state. Now the beauty crooked a finger at her, and she did not reach for the phone in her pocket even once.
    Annie’s pace slowed as she came into town and guessed at the ages of the stone and brick buildings that anchored it. A gabled church bell tower thrust a cross into the air, and Annie’s feet turned in that direction without explanation. At the sight of it, a hundred years of history shivered through her, and she wondered if the residents who built the church could have imagined what she did for a living. The simple old-fashioned church stirred in her an impression of a place to belong. Before it became historic, this was simply a church where the community gathered.
    The twentieth century had rumbled through the region, leaving in its wake signs that lit up and blinked, vehicles of various eras, practical business shelters, rehabbed houses, and ATMs. Yet the town stood poised in the past, weighing its future.
    The ATM outside a stately bank gave her pause. How long could she stay afloat without resorting to a traceable electronic transfer of funds? She could not afford to lose herself in daydreams of scenery and history. She had a business to protect, and neither Rick nor Barrett would give up just because she managed to give them the slip. There was always her retirement fund. Rick might not think to track an IRA that she opened before she met him. The tax hit would be worth it if it meant she could halt Rick’s aggression.
    On Main Street, Annie found a couple of promising shops and rummaged for essentials. Surely it was only a matter of a couple of days, a week at the most, before she could safely return home. She would hire someone to help her, and in a few days she would stop Rick and Barrett’s attempt at legal thievery of her creative work.
    Annie thought of Rufus. The offense against him was plain to see, and now it was spreading to his friend. Yet he refused to take action.
    I’ve got too much invested,
she thought.
I’m not giving up without a fight.
    She stood in the bright afternoon sunlight, unsure what to do next. Find food, she supposed. She could have a meal now and take something back to the motel for later.
    A passing patch of purple made Annie lift her eyes from the sidewalk. Two Amish women, one middle-aged and one younger, exited a furniture store. Annie considered the sign that hung over the door and surmised it was an Amish business. The women smiled at her as they passed on the sidewalk then entered the same